Huawei MateBook 13 Hands-On, First Impressions

Written by Vaughn ChuaPublished • April 14, 2019

Mostly known for its quality and great smartphones, Huawei also produces other devices such as tablets, wearables, and even laptops. Today, at the official release of the company’s newest iteration of the P-series devices, they also announced their latest ultrabook that was first seen back in January, the MateBook 13. I got my hands on this laptop, and so far, I’m pretty impressed on how portable it is. Check out my initial impressions below.

Right off the bat, you’ll definitely see the MateBook 13’s similarity to the Apple MacBook laptops given its silver metallic design and diamond-cut corners. It looks simplistic yet premium which is always a plus. At first, you could easily mistake this ultrabook as an Apple device if you didn’t look at the Huawei logo at the middle of the lid.

I can open the lid with one finger although it only opens halfway as the whole body comes along if you don’t support it while lifting. It’s not bad that this happens because its mass is really light. Checking out the monitor, you’ll see the 13.3-inch 1440 x 2160 display surrounded by slim bezels especially the left and right sides. The top bezel is slightly thicker due to the 1MP webcam situated there. Double the size of the top, and you’ll get the size of the bottom bezel which is still relatively slim. Note that this device sports a 3:2 aspect ratio — a different configuration than the usual 16:9 displays.

There are only three ports in this ultrabook and two of which are located at the left side. One is the USB Type-C Lightning charge port for the device and the other is the 3.5mm audio port along with the LED notification light. Look to the right and you’ll see a lone USB Type-C port for file transfers. It’s somewhat weird to see this kind of setup given that I will most likely use a USB adapter just to accommodate my USB Type-A connector from my mouse. Nevertheless, I’m assuming that Huawei expects users to just use Bluetooth-powered external keyboards and mice for the MateBook 13.

The main body has the same metallic design which really looks premium. Moving to its chiclet keyboard, it has relatively large keys with decent spacing from each other which is quite nice. The buttons have good tactility which is a plus while there is little keyboard flex, indicating that the body is well-built and sturdy. One unique feature of the MateBook 13 is its power button that also serves as the fingerprint scanner. I have not yet tried how fast and accurate it really is but knowing Huawei, I expect it to be very responsive.

Below the keyboard is a rather long clickpad which is really appealing given the ample space that it can consume. It is covered with the same smooth material, giving it a bit of resistance but it’s still good when I ran my fingers across it.

Holding the MateBook 13 with only one hand is pretty easy; with its 1.3kg mass, you won’t have to worry on bringing this ultrabook anywhere. It is also thin, creating an opportunity for it to be a good travel companion. Thanks to its matte finish, it also doesn’t slip off my hand, giving it enough grip overall.

The MateBook 13 runs on either an 8th-Gen Intel Core i7 or i5 processor along with an NVIDIA GeForce MX150 graphics, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB or 512GB of storage. Given that this device is an ultrabook, you wouldn’t need to worry as performance will be smooth and snappy. Its configuration is perfectly fine when you want a business-oriented laptop that is capable of gaming as well. I’ll gladly take it for a full spin if Huawei will send us a unit for a full review so stay tuned!

Here are their prices along with the freebies that you’ll get upon purchasing one:

Core i5 / 8GB RAM / 256GB SSD – PHP 55,990 (comes with a Huawei Bluetooth mouse and Huawei Backpack)
Core i7 / 8GB RAM / 512GB SSD – PHP 69,990 (comes with a Huawei Bluetooth mouse, Huawei Backpack, Huawei Mate Dock 2)

Huawei MateBook 13 specs: